Visit Italy On This Day to discover things that happened today in Italian history, from famous Italians who were born or died on this day to moments that helped shape Italy's life and culture.

At Italy On This Day you will read about events and festivals, about important moments in history, and about the people who have made Italy the country it is today, and where they came from. Italy is a country rich in art and music, fashion and design, food and wine, sporting achievement and political diversity. Italy On This Day provides fascinating insights to help you enjoy it all the more.

31 May 2017

Bar and hotel owner invented way to make coffee faster

Angelo Moriondo owned a hotel and a prestigiousbar in the centre of Turin

Angelo Moriondo, the man credited with inventing the world’s
first espresso coffee machine, died on this day in 1914 in Marentino, a town in
Piedmont, about 20km (12 miles) east of Turin.

Moriondo, who was 62 when he passed away, was the owner of
the Grand-Hotel Ligure in Turin’s Piazza Carlo Felice and the American Bar in
the former Galleria Nazionale on Via Roma.

He came up with the idea of a coffee machine essentially in
the hope of gaining an edge over his competition at a time when coffee was a
hugely popular beverage across Europe and in Italy in particular, but which
still depended on brewing methods that required the customer to wait five
minutes or more to be able to raise a cup to his mouth.

Moriondo figured that if he could find a way to make
multiple cups of coffee simultaneously he would be able to serve more customers
more quickly. He hoped that word would then get round in Turin’s commercial district that
his bars were the ones to go if the pressures of business did not allow time for leisurely breaks.

The design for his machine for which Moriondowas granted a patent in 1884

He never contemplated industrial-scale production of his
invention, his ambitions never extending beyond the needs of his own businesses
and, unlike later espresso machines, his device was not designed for making
individual cups.

But experts say that his invention was undoubtedly the first
to use water and pressurised steam to accelerate the coffee-making process and
it was therefore reasonable to declare it to be the world’s first espresso
machine.

Moriondo was delighted with it but missed a fantastic
opportunity to become the person whose name is synonymous with coffee machines.

He presented his invention at the General Expo of Turin in
1884, where it was awarded the bronze medal.
It was awarded a patent for a period of six years on May 16, 1884 under
the title of "New steam machinery for the economic and instantaneous
confection of coffee beverage, method ‘A. Moriondo’."

The machine consisted of a large boiler that pushed heated
water through a large bed of coffee grounds, with a second boiler producing
steam that would flash the bed of coffee and complete the brew.

One of Desiderio Pavoni's early espresso machines

Conceiving and creating this matchine was an unprecedented
achievement. Yet Moriondo did nothing to commercialise the idea and it was left
to two others, the Milanese duo Luigi Bezzerra and Desiderio Pavoni, to tweak his method and repackage it for the market place.

Moriondo limited himself to the construction of a few
hand-built, machines which he jealously kept under lock and key at one house or
another, convinced that advertising them was a bad idea.

Within a couple of years, Bezzerra and Pavoni had developed
a machine that could produce up to 1,000 cups an hour, brewing an individual shot
of espresso.

Moriondo made a comfortable living from his business
ventures, following in the family’s footsteps as an entrepreneur, but could
have been both wealthier and more famous had he seen the potential in what he
had created.

The Via Roma in modern Turin

Travel tip:

Turin was once the capital of Italy and its shopping streets
reflect its former prestige, with 18km (11 miles) of arcades. A key shopping
area is around Via Roma. As well as the
high street names, shops feature specialists in chocolate, fashion, and
antiquarian books and records.

Travel tip:

The small town of Marentino really consists of three ancient
villages – Marentino, Avuglione and Vernone. It is well known for its locally
produced honey. Marentino is built on a
hill with the church of Maria Vergine, which has a baroque façade and a
substantial bell tower, at its pinnacle. An interesting feature of the
town is the number of houses whose walls are decorated with colourful murals,
the result of a project in 2005 involving 20 artists from all over Italy.

30 May 2017

The principal intellectual spokesman for fascism

Giovanni Gentile wrote part of The Doctrine
of Fascism for Benito Mussolini

Giovanni Gentile, a major figure in Italian idealist
philosophy, was born on this day in 1875 in Castelvetrano in Sicily.

Known as ‘the philosopher of Fascism’, Gentile was the ghostwriter of part of Benito Mussolini’sThe Doctrine of Fascism in 1932. His own
‘actual idealism’ was strongly influenced by the German philosopher, Georg
Hegel.

Gentile's rejection of individualism and acceptance of collectivism helped him justify the totalitarian element of Fascism.

After a series of university appointments, Gentile became
professor of the history of philosophy at the University of Rome in 1917.

While writing The Philosophy of Marx – La filosophia di Marx
– a Hegelian examination of Karl Marx’s ideas, he met writer and philosopher
Benedetto Croce. The two men became friends and co-editors of the periodical La
Critica until 1924, when a lasting disagreement occurred over Gentile’s embrace
of Fascism.

Gentile was Minister of Education in the Fascist government
of Italy from October 1922 to July 1924 carrying out wide reforms, which had a
lasting impact on Italian education.

In 1925 he served as president of two commissions on
constitutional reform, helping to lay the foundations of the Fascist corporate
state.

Gentile is buried in the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence

After acting as president of the Supreme Council of Public
Education and as a member of the Fascist Grand Council between 1925 and 1929,
he saw his political influence steadily decline.

His most important achievement was the Enciclopedia
Italiana, which he began to plan in 1925 and edited until 1943 and he also wrote
prolifically on the subjects of philosophy and education.

After the fall of Benito Mussolini in 1943, Gentile
supported the Fascist Social Republic established by the Germans at Salò. He
served as president of the Academy of Italy, Italy’s foremost intellectual
institution, until his death.

In 1944 a group of anti-Fascist partisans shot Gentile dead
as he returned from the prefecture in Florence. Ironically he had been there
arguing for the release from prison of anti-Fascist intellectuals.

The church of Santa Maria Assunta, also known as the
Chiesa Madre - mother church - in Castelvetrano

Travel tip:

Castelvetrano, the birthplace of Giovanni Gentile, is in the
province of Trapani in Sicily. It is first mentioned in historical records
dating from the 12th century. The Church of St John, which is just outside the
city walls, was founded in 1412. The mother church, Chiesa Madre, which dates
back to the 16th century, is in the town’s main square, Piazza Tagliavia. The
remains of Selinunte, an ancient Greek city, are just outside the city, on a
site overlooking the sea.

The Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence

Travel tip:

Gentile was living and working in Florence when he was shot
dead by anti-Fascists on 15 April, 1944. He is buried in the church of Santa
Croce beside the remains of Galileo and Machiavelli. The Basilica of Santa
Croce is the principal Franciscan Church in Florence and is the burial place of
some of the most illustrious Italians. It is also known to Italians as the
Temple of the Italian Glories.

29 May 2017

Artistic collaborator and wife of Dario Fo

Franca Rame in a publicity shot from a
brief but unsuccessful movie career

The actress and writer Franca Rame, much of whose work was
done in collaboration with her husband, the Nobel Prize-winning actor,
playwright and satirist Dario Fo, died in Milan on this day in 2013 at the age
of 83.

One of Italy's most admired and respected stage performers, her
contribution to Dario Fo’s work was such that his 1997 Nobel prize for
literature probably should have been a joint award. In the event, on receipt of
the award, Fo announced he was sharing it with his wife.

Rame was also a left-wing militant. A member of the Italian
Communist Party from 1967, she was elected to the Italian senate in 2006 under
the banner of the Italy of Values party, a centre-left anti-corruption grouping
led by Antonio di Pietro, the former prosecutor who had led the Mani Pulite (“Clean
Hands”) corruption investigation in the 1990s.

Later she was an independent member of the Communist
Refoundation Party. Her political views
often heavily influenced her writing, in which her targets tended to be the
Italian government and the Roman Catholic Church. She was also an outspoken champion of women’s
rights.

Her politics made her some enemies, however. In 1973, she was kidnapped at gunpoint on a
Milan street by a group of neo-Fascist men who raped and tortured her. When she was released, the group said it
was revenge against her and Fo for their political activism.

Franca Rame in 1952, when she began her relationship
with Dario Fo after they met through work

Born in Parabiago, a town of almost 30,000 people in the
north-western quarter of the Milan metropolitan area, Rame was the daughter of
an actor and a militant socialist father and a strict Catholic mother. She was
almost born on the stage, appearing in a performance with her mother when she
was only eight days old.

At the age of 18, and with the photogenic looks of a 1950s
blonde bombshell, she began a theatre career in Milan. She met Dario Fo when
they were members of the same company. Fo was smitten from an early stage and
to his surprise and delight the attraction was mutual. They married in 1954 and their son
Jacopo, now himself a writer, was born in 1955.

Rame had a brief but only modestly successful movie career before switching her focus to the theatre. As a professional partnership, she and Fo's first hit, Gli
Arcangeli non Giacano a Flipper – Archangels Don’t Play Pinball – played at the
Odeon theatre in Milan in 1959, where they were subsequently invited to write
and perform a new play every year.

Subsequent successes included Isabella, Tre Caravelle e un
Cacciaballe – Isabella, Three Sailing Ships and a Con Man – set in Spain in the
early years of the inquisition, in which Rame played Queen Isabella.

Dario Fo with Franca Rame and their son Jacopo

In time, however, they gave up commercial theatre in favour
of forming co-operative groups and in 1970 founded their own militant theatre group,
La Comune, based at the Palazzina Liberty, an abandoned pavilion. It was there
that Rame starred in Fo’s acclaimed Non Si Paga! Non Si Paga! (Can’t Pay? Won’t
Pay!) and that she wrote and performed in a one-woman show Tutta Casa, Letto e
Chiesa (It’s All Bed, Board and Church).

Their relationship was turbulent at times and at one stage
she announced their separation. Yet they patched up their differences and even
sent themselves up in a play, Coppia Aperta (The Open Couple).

Rame and Fo were particularly despairing of Italy’s support
for Silvio Berlusconiwhen the country shifted to the right in the 1990s, even more
when he was granted a return to power in 2001. Their play L’Anomalo Bicefalo
(The Two Headed Anomaly), a satire about a political rally in Sicily which
features an assassination attempt on Berlusconi and the Russian leader Vladimir
Putin, infuriated Berlusconi when Rame’s performance in a comic scene as his
wife, Veronica, was praised by Veronica herself.

Her opposition to Berlusconi was part of her motivation for
joining forces with Di Pietro, for whom Berlusconi’s scorn had been undisguised
during the Mani Pulite trials, prior to her election to the senate.

Rame is buried at the Monumental Cemetery in Milan.

The Prepositurale church in Parabiago

Travel tip:

Parabiago grew as an industrial centre in the 1960s, when its
footwear industry, established in the late 19th century, enjoyed a
boom. It became known as The City of the Shoe. Notable churches include the Prepositurale
church dedicated to saints Gervasio and Protasio, built in 1610 on the orders
of the Bishop of Milan, San Carlo Borromeo. The neoclassical façade, added between
1780 and 1781, was designed by Giuseppe Piermarini. Parabiago is also home to Villa
Maggi-Corvini , or simply Villa Corvini, located at the beginning of the historic
Via Santa Maria. The villa is part of the Parco Corvini municipal park, which
is open to the public.

The Palazzina Liberty used to be the cafeteria-restaurant
at the Verziere market in Milan

Travel tip:

The Palazzina Liberty in Milan’s Parco Vittorio Formentano,
on the eastern side of the city centre, was built in 1908 to house the cafeteria-restaurant
in the Verziere fruit and vegetable market but fell into disuse when the market
moved to a different location. Dario Fo took it over in the 1970s and in 1980
it became home to Milan’s civic orchestra before being renovated in 1992 and
opened as a cultural and recreational facility for the city, hosting orchestral
concerts, film festivals and poetry events among other things.

28 May 2017

Father was a pioneer of game in Italy

Leandro Jayarajah

Leandro Jayarajah, the captain and head coach of Roma Capannelle
Cricket Club, was born on this day in 1987 in Rome.

His father, Francis Alphonsus Jayarajah, usually known as
Alfonso, is a Sri Lankan national who founded what became the Capannelle club
in 1978 and was one of the pioneers of organised cricket in Italy.

Alfonso was co-founder in 1980 of the Federazione Cricket
Italiana, under whose auspices an Italian cricket championship has been played
since 1983.

Capannelle, which takes its name from the racecourse in
Rome, the Ippodromo Capannelle, where the club plays its home matches, have
been Serie A champions on five occasions, most recently under Leandro’s leadership in 2013.

The club began life as the Commonwealth Wandering Giants
Cricket Club, changing its name when the chance to use the green space in the
middle of the racecourse as a permanent home presented itself in 1983.

Alfonso Jayarajah, founder of RomaCapannelle Cricket Club

Leandro, a right-handed batsman who bowls off spin and occasionally keeps wicket has followed his father into international cricket
as a member of the Italy team, which is currently 28th in the world
rankings. In club cricket he made a top score of 80 not out during Capannelle's 2013 title-winning season. He has also played club cricket in England and Australia.

His Italian mother, Franca Maria Beranger, who died in 2015,
was president of Capannelle from 1988 to 2014, having helped her husband with
the running of the club since its inception.

Leandro – nicknamed Mati – made his debut for Italy in 2010
and, as a qualified coach, is part of the national team’s coaching staff,
looking after specifically the Under-17s.

His father arrived in Italy in 1968 to study at the Sapienza
University of Rome and remained in the city, working for the Food and
Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. He played for the Commonwealth
War Graves Commission Cricket Club against British and Australian Embassies in
1975 for what was dubbed the Rome Ashes.

He became captain of the Italian national cricket team in
1984 and was the first captain to lead the cricketing Azzurri on an
international tour when they visited England the same year.

Cricket did not capture the imagination of Italians the same
way that football did when British traders introduced the game in the early
years of the 20th century but was revived in the 1960s when embassy
teams began to play each other.

Recently, the popularity of the game has been boosted by
immigrants from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, with more Italians
taking up the game than at any stage.

The six teams in Serie A must have a quota of Italians but
teams made up entirely of foreign-born players are allowed in the lower
divisions.

Leandro is a delegate for Lazio on Italy’s national Olympic
committee. A graduate in political science, away from cricket he is a property manager.

Rome's Ippodromo Capannelle, home of the Derby Italiano

Travel tip:

The Ippodromo Capannelle first staged horse racing in 1881 and
was rebuilt in 1926 to a design by Paolo Vietti Violi, the notable architect
whose speciality was race tracks. Capannelle was among more than 33 circuits he
designed, including tracks in Asia, South America and Africa. Situated about
15km (9 miles) south-east of Rome city centre close to Via Appia, it is currently the
home of three Group 1 flat races – the Premio Presidente della Repubblica, the
Premio Lydia Tesio and the Premio Roma. The track also hosts the most valuable
flat race in Italy, the Derby Italiano.

The Baths of Caracalla in Rome

Travel tip:

The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United
Stations, where Leandro’s father, Alphonso worked after arriving in Rome from
Sri Lanka, is a modern building on the busy Via delle Terme di Caracalla, which
links the Circus Maximus with the Baths of Caracalla, two of the city’s
foremost Roman ruins. The Baths of Caracalla were thermal baths built between AD 211/212 and 216/217, during the
reigns of emperors Septimius Severus and Caracalla. A year-round tourist
attraction, the ruins have been the venue for a number of music concerts,
notably including the historic Three Tenors concert, featuring Luciano
Pavarotti, José Carreras and Plácido
Domingo, staged during the 1990 World Cup finals, hosted by Italy.

27 May 2017

Mystery of the beautiful woman in painting by Leonardo

For many years, it was assumed the womanin Da Vinci's La belle Ferronnière wasSforza's mistress, Lucrezia Crivelli

Lucrezia Crivelli, mistress of Ludovico Sforza, Duke of
Milan, who was for a long time believed to be the subject of a painting by
Leonardo da Vinci, died on this day in 1508 in Canneto sull’Oglio in Lombardy.

Crivelli served as a lady in waiting to Ludovico Sforza’s
wife, Beatrice d’Este, from 1475 until Beatrice’s death in 1497.

She also became the Duke’s mistress and gave birth to his
son, Giovanni Paolo, who went on to become the first Marquess of Caravaggio and
a celebrated condottiero.

Crivelli lived for many years in the Castello of Canneto
near Mantua under the protection of Isabella d’Este, the elder sister of
Beatrice, until her death in 1508.

Coincidentally, her former lover, Ludovico Sforza, is
believed to have died on the same day in 1508 while being kept prisoner in the
dungeons of the castle of Loches in Touraine in France, having been captured by the French during the Italian Wars.

It was never proved, but it was assumed for many years that Crivelli
may have been the subject of Leonardo da Vinci’s painting La belle Ferronnière,
which is displayed in the Louvre in Paris. Another theory was that either
Beatrice d’Este or Isabella of Aragon could have been the subject.

It is now thought LucreziaCrivelli was the subjectof Da Vinci's Profile of a Young Lady

It was originally believed to be Crivelli because da Vinci
had painted another of Ludovico Sforza’s mistresses, Cecilia Gallerani, in his
painting Lady with an Ermine.

Eventually the theory was disproved when a painting of
Lucrezia Crivelli, also by da Vinci and which had been kept by her family for
centuries, was put on display in Germany in 1995. The woman in this painting,
Profile of a Young Lady, is thought not to be the same woman who featured in La belle Ferronnière.

The real Crivelli painting has been examined by the man who
restored The Last Supper, Pinin Barcillon Brambilla, who found some pigments to
be the same as those of the Milanese mural.

The Castello Sforzesco in Milan

Travel tip

One of the main sights in Milan is the impressive Sforza
castle, Castello Sforzesco, built in the 15th century by Francesco Sforza, Duke
of Milan. After Ludovico Sforza became Duke of Milan in 1494 he commissioned
Leonardo da Vinci to fresco several rooms. The castle now houses some of the
city’s museums and art galleries. For more information visit
www.milanocastello.it

Travel tip

Canneto sull’Oglio, where Lucrezia Crivelli died, is in the
province of Mantua in Lombardy, about 100 km (62 miles) south of Milan. It is home
to the restaurant Dal Pescatore, which has three Michelin stars. Run by the
Santini family, the restaurant is famous for its pumpkin-stuffed tortelli.

26 May 2017

F1 champion killed amid eerie echoes of father's death

Alberto Ascari (centre), pictured a few weeks before his fatalcrash with his friends Luigi Villoresi (left), Eugenio Castellotti (right) and the famous engineer Vittorio Jano.

Racing driver Alberto Ascari, who was twice Formula One
champion, died on this day in 1955 in an accident at the Monza racing circuit
in Lombardy, just north of Milan.

A hugely popular driver, his death shocked Italy and motor
racing fans in particular.

What many found particularly chilling was a series of
uncanny parallels with the death of his father, Antonio Ascari, who was also a
racing driver, 30 years previously.

Alberto had gone to Monza to watch his friend, Eugenio
Castellotti, test a Ferrari 750 Monza sports car, which they were to co-drive
the car in the 1000 km Monza race.

Contracted to Lancia at the time, although he had been given
dispensation to drive for Ferrari in the race, Ascari was not supposed to test drive
the car, yet he could not resist trying a few laps, even though he was dressed
in a jacket and tie, in part to ensure he had not lost his nerve after a serious accident a few days earlier.

Ascari on the cover of a magazine inArgentina, where he was very popular

When he emerged from a fast curve on the third lap, however,
the car inexplicably skidded, turned on its nose and somersaulted twice. Ascari
was wearing Castellotti’s white helmet but he suffered multiple injuries nonetheless
when he was thrown out of the car and survived for only a few minutes,
pronounced dead at the scene.

There were several eerie similarities between the deaths of
Alberto and his father.

Alberto Ascari died on May 26, 1955, at the age of 36, the
same age as his father, Antonio, who was killed in the French Grand Prix, on July 26,
1925. Alberto was only four days older than his father had been.

That both should die on the 26th of the month at
the same age was a strange coincidence, yet it did not end there.

Even more weirdly, both were killed four days after
surviving serious accidents, Antonio having crashed while practising ahead of
the Grand Prix in which he died, Alberto having lost control of his car during
the Monaco Grand Prix and gone into the harbour.

Both suffered fatal crashes at the exit of fast left-hand
corners, both had won 13 championship Grand Prix events and both left behind a
wife and two children.

Alberto’s accident occurred on the Curva del Vialone, one of
the Monza track's most challenging high-speed corners. The corner was renamed
in his honour but has subsequently been replaced with a chicane, now called
Variante Ascari.

He was laid to rest next to the grave of his father in the
Cimitero Monumentale in Milan. His death was considered to be a factor in the
withdrawal of Lancia from motor racing in 1955, just three days after his
funeral, although it was also a fact that the company was in financial trouble.

Ascari, in his Lancia, chases the legendary Argentina JuanManuel Fangio, in a Mercedes, in a 1954 race

Born in Milan, Alberto was only seven when he lost his
father yet was not put off his desire to become a racing driver.

He was one of the best drivers around when Formula One
launched in 1950, with a string of victories in Grand Prix events over 1948 and
1949. His success continued in 1950, although his nine race wins did not include
any in the inaugural Formula One series, won by another Italian, Giuseppe Farina.

The 1951 season brought seven more victories and this time
two of them counted as he finished second to the legendary Argentinian Juan
Manuel Fangio.

He went one better and won the drivers’ championship in
1952, winning the final six rounds after Fangio dropped out midway through the
season, and defended his title successfully in 1953.

After his death, a street in Rome was named in his honour,
while both the Autodromo Nazionale Monza and Autodromo Oscar Alfredo Gálvez in
Buenos Aires, which staged the Argentine Grand Prix between 1953 and 1998, have
chicanes named after him.

Monza's Duomo, the striking Basilica of San Giovanni Battista

Travel tip:

Apart from the motor racing circuit, Monza is notable for
its 13th century Basilica of San Giovanni Battista, often known as Monza
Cathedral, which contains the famous Corona Ferrea or Iron Crown, bearing
precious stones. According to tradition,
the crown was found on Jesus's Cross. Note
also the Villa Reale, built in the neoclassical style by Piermarini at the end
of the 18th Century, which has a sumptuous interior and a court theatre.

Travel tip:

The Cimitero Monumentale is one of the two largest
cemeteries in Milan, the other one being the Cimitero Maggiore. Designed by the
architect Carlo Maciachini (1818–1899), it was planned to consolidate a number
of small cemeteries that used to be scattered around the city into a single
location. It can be found in the
northern part of the city, adjacent to Chinatown and Porta Volta. As well as Ascari and his father, it is the
resting place of the tenor Franco Corelli, the conductor Arturo Toscanini, the
poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti – who founded the futurist movement - the
novelist and writer Alessandro Manzoni, and the founder of AC Milan football
club, the Englishman Herbert Kilpin.

25 May 2017

Won gold medal over historic course in Athens

Stefano Baldini, Italy's fastest
marathon runner to date

Stefano Baldini, the marathon runner who was Olympic
champion in Athens in 2004 and twice won the European marathon title, as born
on this day in 1971 in Castelnovo di Sotto, about 14km (nine miles) north-west
of the city of Reggio Emilia.

Although Baldini’s class was not doubted, his Olympic gold
was slightly tarnished by an incident seven kilometres from the finish when a
spectator broke through the barriers and attacked the Brazilian runner,
Vanderlei de Lima, who was leading the field.

The spectator, an Irishman called Conelius Horan who had
disrupted the British Grand Prix motor race the previous year, was wrestled off
de Lima by another spectator but the incident cost the Brazilian 15 to 20
seconds and much momentum. He was passed subsequently by Baldini and finished third.

Baldini finished the race, which followed the historic route
from Marathon to Athens, in two hours 10 minutes and 55 seconds,
although this was not the fastest time of his career.

His best was the 2:07:56 he clocked at the 1997 London
Marathon, when he finished second, in what is still the fastest time by an
Italian over the marathon distance.

Baldini comes from a family of 11 children, among whom he
has two brothers who were distance runners, Marco once achieving a time of 2:16:32
in the marathon. Throughout his career he has run in the colours of the Calcestruzzi
Corradini Rubiera club, based in the town of Rubiera, midway between
Reggio Emilia and Modena.

Stefano Baldini (left) passes the Brazilian Vanderlei de Lima
on the way to winning the 2004 Olympic marathon in Athens

He began racing over long distances even as a teenager.
Initially his specialities were the 5,000m and 10,000m and he was 24 before he
took on his first marathon, when he finished sixth in the Venice Marathon in
2:11:01.

Before winning his Olympic gold in Athens had already taken
part in the marathon in Sydney in 2000, having competed at 5,000m and 10,000m
at the Atlanta Games in 1996, making the semi-finals in the former.

He took the gold medal in the half-marathon at the World
championships in 1996 in Palma de Mallorca.

His first important marathon victory came at the European championships
in 1998 in Budapest. He won the Rome Marathon
in the same year.

Baldini won a second European gold eight years later in Gothenburg.
His best performances over the marathon distance in the World championships
came in Edmonton in 2001 and Paris in 2003, taking the bronze medal on each
occasion.

Stefano Baldini in action in the
New York marathon

He went to Beijing in 2008 to defend his Olympic title but after
finishing 12th he announced his retirement, having the same year
competed in his ninth London Marathon, in which he also came home 12th. By then Baldini was 37, although he did
attempt a comeback in 2010 before announcing that he would be giving up for
good and concentrating on his work with the Italian Athletics Federation.

In 2014, by which time he had become established as the technical
director for youth athletics in Italy, Baldino took part in a charity event to
mark the 10th anniversary of his Athens victory, which made him the
second Italian, after Gelindo Bordin, to win an Olympic marathon gold.

Married to the former 400m runner Virna de Angeli, he lives
today in Rubiera with his wife and three children, Alessia, Laura and Lorenzo.

The Via Appia forms Rubiera's porticoed main street

Travel tip:

The town of Rubiera was established in around 1200 when a
castle was built to protect the city of Modena. It sits alongside the Secchia
river and flanks the Via Appia. The castle became a prison at the time the town
was owned by the Este family. It was sold at auction in 1873, half becoming
private property and half taken on by the municipal authorities. Today very little remains of the original
structure. The town itself is
characterised by streets lined with porticoes.
Notable buildings include the 15th century Palazzo Sacrati
and the art nouveau Teatro Herberia.

Travel tip:

Castelnovo di Sotto, a community of around 8,000 people in
the Po Valley, is famous as the home of one of Italy’s most ancient carnivals,
dating back to the 16th century, and the birthplace of Luigi Melegari,
one of the founders of the Young Italy movement alongside Giuseppe Mazzini and
an important figure in the Risorgimento.

24 May 2017

Monarch who was descended from Charles I of England

Charles Emmanuel IV, who was King of Sardinia from 1796
until he abdicated in 1802 and might once have had a claim to the throne of
England, was born on this day in 1751 in Turin.

Born Carlo Emanuele Ferdinando Maria di Savoia, he was the
eldest son of Victor Amadeus III, King of Sardinia, and of his wife Infanta
Maria Antonia Ferdinanda of Spain. From his birth he was known as the Prince of
Piedmont.

In 1775, he married Marie Clotilde of France, the daughter
of Louis, Dauphin of France, and Princess Marie-Josèphe of Saxony, and sister
of King Louis XVI of France.

Although it was essentially a political marriage over which
they had little choice, the couple became devoted to one another.

With the death of his father in October 1796, Charles
Emmanuel inherited the throne of Sardinia, a kingdom that included not only the
island of Sardinia, but also the whole of Piedmont and other parts of north-west
Italy.

He took on a difficult political situation along with the throne,
only months after his father had signed the disadvantageous Treaty of
Paris with the French Republic following the four-year War of the First
Coalition, in which Napoleon’s army prevailed. The treaty ceded the Duchy of
Savoy and the County of Nice and gave the French army free passage through
Piedmont to attack other parts of Italy.

The death of his wife Marie Clothilde was
trigger for Charles Emmanuel's abdication

In December 1798, the French under General Barthèlemy Joubert
occupied Turin and forced Charles Emmanuel to surrender all his territories on
the Italian mainland and to withdraw to Sardinia.

After an unsuccessful attempt to regain Piedmont the following
year, he and his wife went to live in Rome and in Naples as guests of the
wealthy Colonna family.

It was the death in 1802 of Marie Clothilde that changed
things for Charles Emmanuel, who was so grief-stricken he decided to abdicate in
favour of his brother Victor Emmanuel. They had no children.

He retained the title of King but stepped away from responsibility
and spent his life in Rome and in the nearby town of Frascati.

In Frascati he was a frequent guest of his cousin, Henry
Benedict Stuart, Cardinal Duke of York and the last member of the Royal House
of Stuart.

Charles was actually descended from Henrietta Anne Stuart,
the youngest daughter of King Charles I of England and Scotland, whereas Henry Benedict Stuart was descended
from James II, who was the second son of Charles I.

When Henry died in 1807, Charles Emmanuel became the senior
heir-general of Charles I, although there is no evidence
that he attempted to make a public claim to the title of King of England or
Scotland.

The Palazzo Colonna in Rome, where Charles Emmanuel died

In fact, he appeared to have little interest in power. In 1815
at the age of 64, he took simple vows in the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). Although
he was never ordained to the priesthood, he spent much of the rest of his life
at the Jesuit novitiate in Rome.

He died at the Palazzo Colonna in Rome in October 1819 and
is buried in the Church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale.

Travel tip:

Sardinia is a large island off the coast of Italy in the
Mediterranean Sea. It has sandy beaches and a mountainous landscape. The
southern city of Cagliari, from where Charles’s successor, Victor Emmanuel I,
ruled, has a modern industrial area but also a medieval quarter called
Castello, which has narrow streets, fine palaces and a 13th century Cathedral
and is a fascinating part of the city to explore.

The Cattedrale di San Pietro Apostolo in Frascati

Travel tip:

Frascati, an ancient city 20km (miles) south-east of Rome in
the Alban Hills, is notable for the Cattedrale di San Pietro Apostolo, which contains the tombstone
of Charles Edward Stuart – Henry Benedict’s brother – who was also known as
Bonnie Prince Charlie or the Young Pretender. Although his body was moved to St
Peter’s in Rome, to be laid to rest with his mother and father, his heart was
left in Frascati in a small urn under the floor below his monument.

23 May 2017

First Italian to referee a World Cup final

Sergio Gonella, the first Italian football referee to take
charge of a World Cup final, was born on this day in 1933 in Asti, a city in
Piedmont best known for its wine production.

Gonella was appointed to officiate in the 1978 final between
the Netherlands and the hosts Argentina in Buenos Aires and although he was
criticised by many journalists and football historians for what they perceived
as a weak performance lacking authority, few matches in the history of the
competition can have presented a tougher challenge.

Against a backcloth of political turmoil in a country which
had suffered a military coup only two years earlier and where opponents of the
regime were routinely kidnapped and tortured, or simply disappeared, this was
Argentina’s chance to build prestige by winning the biggest sporting event in
the world, outside the Olympics.

Rumours of subterfuge surrounded most of Argentina’s matches
and when the final arrived the atmosphere in the stadium was as intimidating as
anything Gonella would have experienced in his whole 13-year professional
career.

The match began with an unprecedented delay, caused first by
the Argentine team’s deliberate late arrival on the field, an arrogant tactic
designed to unsettle the brilliantly talented Dutch team, and then by the
Argentine captain, Daniel Passarella, objecting to the plaster cast on the arm
of Dutch defender René van de Kerkhof.

Sergio Gonella with the Dutch player Rene van der
Kerkhof and the offending plaster cast

Van de Kerkhof had worn the cast all through the tournament
with no complaints but Passarella said it was potentially dangerous and Gonella
ordered that it be removed, at which the Dutch players threatened to walk off
en masse. Eventually a compromise was
reached whereby Van de Kerkhof taped some foam rubber over the top of the cast.

The match eventually kicked off nine minutes later than
scheduled. Once play began the tackles flew in, with neither sign showing much
restraint, and Gonella was never really in control. What’s more, in the
partisan atmosphere, he appeared almost always gave the benefit of any doubt to
Argentina, who ran out 3-1 winners after extra time.

Years later he defended his performance, answering
accusations that he was party to some sort of conspiracy to ensure that
Argentina won by pointing out that with the scores at 1-1 and only seconds
remaining of the 90 minutes, Rob Rensenbrink of the Netherlands rolled a shot
against a post and Argentina were therefore only millimetres away from losing
the game.

Gonella, a banker by profession, began to officiate in Serie
A matches in 1965 at the age of 32, immediately identifying himself as a
no-nonsense arbiter by awarding seven penalties in his first seven matches.

He was generally seen as an impartial disciplinarian and had
been a referee at the top level in domestic football for only seven seasons
when he was given his first major international assignment, in charge of the
final of the European Under-21 championships.

Sergio Gonella in a recent TV interview

In 1976 he was the man with the whistle in the senior
European championship final between Czechoslovakia and West Germany in Belgrade
and when he was given the 1978 World Cup final he became one of only two men to
take charge of both these prestigious matches.

In domestic football he won the Giovanni Mauro prize for the
season’s best referee in Italian football in 1972 and in 1974 he officiated in the
Coppa Italia final between Bologna and Palermo.

He quit refereeing after the 1978 final. Referees were part time in that era and
Gonella said he wished to have the opportunity to take his summer holidays with
his family rather than with a whistle round his neck at a football
tournament. He had officiated in 175
Serie A matches.

Gonella remained in football, however, as a designator of
match referees in Serie A and was president of the Italian Referees’
Association from 1998 until 2000.

For a while during his career he lived in La Spezia before
returning to Asti province, specifically the village of Calliano, about 14km
(nine miles) north-east of the city of Asti and about 45km (28 miles) east of
Turin.

He was inducted to Italian football’s Hall of Fame in 2013.
Two other Italians have refereed the World Cup final – Pierluigi Collina in
2002 and Nicola Rizzoli in 2014.

The Torre dei Comentini

Travel tip:

Asti is a city of around 75,000 people situated in the plain
of the Tanaro river about 55km (34 miles) east of Turin. Many of his most
important historical buildings are from the 12th and 13th
centuries, when Asti grew to be the most powerful city in Piedmont when there
was a fashion for building towers as symbols of power and prestige, hence Asti acquiring
the nickname of the ‘city of 100 towers.’ There were thought to be 120 at one
stage, of which several remain, including the Torre dei Comentini and the
Torre de Regibus. Notable churches include the Romanesque-Gothic Cathedral of
Santa Maria Assunta and the Collegiata di San Secondo. Every September the city
hosts the Palio di Asti, less famous than the Palio di Siena but the oldest in
Italy, now staged in the triangular Piazza Alfieri.

The hilltop village of Calliano

Travel tip:

Calliano is a pretty village built on a hill between two
valleys characterised by a network of streets spiralling down from the church
of Santissimo Nome di Maria, right at the very top of the hill and visible from
the surrounding area. Calliano is also
known for its local pasta dish, agnolotti d’asino – pasta envelopes similar to
ravioli, stuffed with donkey meat.

22 May 2017

Famous fountain now helps raise money for the poor

Rome’s iconic Trevi Fountain, Fontana di Trevi, was
officially opened by Pope Clement XIII on this day in 1762.

Standing at more than 26 metres high and 49 metres wide it
is the largest Baroque fountain in Rome and probably the most famous fountain
in the world.

It has featured in films such as La Dolce Vita and Three
Coins in the Fountain.

For more than 400 years a fountain served Rome at the
junction of three roads, tre vie, using water from one of Ancient Rome’s
aqueducts.

In 1629 Pope Urban VIII asked Gian Lorenzo Bernini to draw
up possible renovations but the project was abandoned when the pope died.

In 1730 Pope Clement XII organised a contest to design a new
fountain. The Florentine Alessandro Galilei originally won but there was such
an outcry in Rome that the commission was eventually awarded to a Roman, Nicola
Salvi.

Work on the fountain began in 1732 but Salvi died in 1751
when it was only half finished. Made from Travertine stone quarried in Tivoli
near Rome, the fountain was completed by Giuseppe Pannini, with Oceanus (god of
all water), designed by Pietro Bracci, set in the central niche.

Coins are traditionally thrown into the fountain using the
right hand over the left shoulder. This was the theme of the 1954 film Three
Coins in the Fountain and the award-winning song of that name.

An estimated 3000 euros are now thrown into the fountain
each day and the money is used to subsidise a supermarket for needy people in
Rome.

Travel tip:

One of Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s most spectacular works in Rome
is the fountain of the Four Rivers, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, in Piazza
Navona, with four marble figures symbolising the four major rivers of the
world. It was designed in 1651 for Pope Innocent X.

The Fontana del Tritone in Piazza Barberini

Travel tip:

The Fountain of the Tritons, Fontana del Tritone, in Piazza
Barberini in Rome was designed and built by Bernini near the entrance to
Palazzo Barberini, the home of Pope Urban VIII’s family.

21 May 2017

Sicilian head of Philadelphia mob known as 'the Gentle Don'

Angelo Bruno was the head of the
Philadelphia crime family for 20 years

Angelo Bruno, a mobster who ran the Philadelphia Mafia for
two decades, was born Angelo Annaloro in Villalba, in the province of
Caltanissetta, in Sicily, on this day in 1910.

Bruno was known as “the Gentle Don” because he preferred to
solve problems and consolidate his power through non-violent means, such as
bribery, and commissioned murders only as a last resort.

The son of a grocer, he emigrated to the United States in
his teens and settled in Philadelphia. He became a close associate of New York
crime family boss Carlo Gambino. Bruno dropped the name Annaloro and replaced
it with his paternal grandmother's maiden name, Bruno.

Bruno’s dislike of violence was not driven by any compassion
for his fellow man. During his early
days in Philadelphia, he worked for a series of bosses and did not shirk the
tasks he had to perform in order to be rise through the ranks, which included
carrying out killings himself.

But in 1959, when he succeeded Joseph Ida as boss of the
Philadelphia crime family, he decided it was in his interests and those of his
criminal organisation to operate in a way that avoided attracting unwanted
attention.

In other cities, the tendency of Mafia families to embark on
campaigns of violence to strengthen their powerbase inevitably resulted in the
authorities cracking down on mob activity.

Bruno, whose longest time in prison was two years after he
refused to testify before a grand jury, reasoned that keeping his operations
relatively low key was the best way to achieve success.

Therefore, he preferred to remove obstacles to his progress
by bribery rather than murder, and was able to operate for two decades with
only minimal interference from law enforcement officers.

However, it was his old-school methods that ultimately
proved his downfall.

Under Bruno’s rule, involvement of the Philadelphia family in
narcotics trafficking was off-limits. He insisted that the family maintained
its focus on more traditional Cosa Nostra operations, such as bookmaking,
prostitution and loansharking.

However, by allowing other gangs, notably members of the
Gambino family, to distribute heroin in Philadelphia in return for a share of
the proceeds, he attracted opposition from inside the family from individuals
who felt they were missing out on an opportunity to make big profits.

Meanwhile, as Atlantic City, traditionally part of the
Philadelphia empire, grew as a gambling centre, Bruno allowed Gambino gangs to
take a slice of that lucrative market, too.

How the Philadelphia Daily News
announced Bruno's murder in 1980

Several factions within the Philadelphia crime family began
to conspire against Bruno, who was murdered on March 12, 1980, as he returned
to his home in South Philadelphia after going out to dinner. He was killed in
his car by an assailant who shot him in the back of the head.

There were several suspects, three of whom were themselves
found dead within weeks of Bruno’s murder.
Antonio Caponigro, Bruno’s consigliere – advisor – and who was believed to have
ordered the execution of his boss, was murdered before police were able to track him down,
as were Frank Sindone and John Simone, the Mafiosi suspected of carrying out
the killing.

Bruno's driver, John Stanfa, who escaped with
only minor injuries, was also a suspect in the murder. He was not killed but
would eventually be sentenced to eight years in jail for refusing to testify
during the trials.

The turnout for Bruno’s funeral in Philadelphia was
substantial. The procession involved more than 100 cars and about 1,000 people
turned up at the Holy Cross Cemetery for the service.

Travel tip:

Villalba, a town of around 1,800 inhabitants, is known as
the città bianca – white city - because of the large number of white houses. It
is situated in a hilly inland area of western Sicily some 98km (61 miles) south-east
of Palermo and 51km (32 miles) north of Caltanissetta. The town grew in size in the 18th
century, which saw the building of its two main churches, the Chiesa Madre and
the Chiesa della Conciliazione and the palace of Nicolò Palmieri Morillo, also
built during the 18th century, who owned much of the land.

The church of San Sebastiano in the
city of Caltanissetta

Travel tip:

The city of Caltanissetta has a population of more than
80,000 and despite being in an area of volcanic activity – notably the mud
volcanoes of the so-called Hill of the Volcanoes a short distance outside the city – has many
notable and well preserved buildings.
The Cathedral of Santa Maria La Nova, built over the late 16th
and early 17th centuries, has a Renaissance style that is unusual in
the area and contains frescoes by the Flemish painter Guglielmo Borremans. In front of the cathedral on Piazza Garibaldi
is the church of San Sebastiano, built in the 16th century as a
gesture of thanks to San Sebastian for deliverance from the plague. Formerly a major centre for sulphur mining,
the town now is famous for the production of the liqueur Amaro Averna.

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All facts given on this website have been carefully researched and are published by the Italy On This Day Editor in good faith. All travel advice, hotel and restaurant recommendations are based on information that has been checked and was correct at the time of writing.